Various Artists - Brum Beat (1967)

This album was going to be the first in a series of collections of rare singles from the 60's, based on an article in the current 'Record Collector', which looked at the output of nine British cities, to see which one produced the best music. Birmingham opened the article, and had an impressive roster of singles by artists who would later go on to achieve great fame in other bands, including some solo singles by Justin Hayward, later of The Moody Blues, The N'Betweens, who later became Slade, Jeff Lynne's early band The Nightriders, The Craig, featuring Carl Palmer on drums, and singles by Robert Plant, both as a solo artist and with the band Listen. While the others cities put up a good fight to be the home of the best music, it turned out that only Birmingham was really big in the 60's, with Manchester's best period being the Madchester indie/dance era of the 80's, Belfast's was punk in the late 70's, Leeds favoured 80's new wave, Sheffield's was the electro-pop bands of the same period, Bristol's was the trip-hop scene of the 90's, and perhaps surprisingly Liverpool's was judged to be the indie/new wave scene of the 80's. I put this together after reading the Birmingham article, and then when I went back to read the rest I found I couldn't make any more, so I decided to post it anyway, and it's now a series of one. I think it's still worthwhile as it's quite a nice collection of hard to find 60's singles by now-famous artists, housed in an updated sleeve which does actually come from a real 1964 collection of Brummie music.      

Track listing

01 Day Must Come - Justin Hayward 1965
02 London Is Behind Me - Justin Hayward 1965
03 I Can't Face The World Without You - Justin Hayward 1965
04 I'll Be Here Tomorrow - Justin Hayward 1965
05 You Better Run - Listen 1966
06 Everybody's Gonna Say - Listen 1966
07 Love Me Right Now - The Nightriders 1966
08 It's Only The Dog - The Nightriders 1966
09 Your Friend - The Nightriders 1966
10 You Better Run - The N'Betweens 1966
11 Evil Witch Man - The N'Betweens 1966
12 I Must Be Mad - The Craig 1966
13 Suspense - The Craig 1966
14 Our Song - Robert Plant 1967
15 Laughin' Cryin' Laughin' - Robert Plant 1967
16 Long Time Coming - Robert Plant 1967
17 I've Got A Secret - Robert Plant 1967